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The Sherlock Holmes
The Sherlock Holmes
“It is dated from Grosvenor Mansions, written with a quill pen, and the
noble lord has had the misfortune to get a smear of ink upon the outer side
of his right little finger,” remarked Holmes as he folded up the epistle.
“He says four o’clock. It is three now. He will be here in an hour.”
“Then I have just time, with your assistance, to get clear upon the
subject. Turn over those papers and arrange the extracts in their order of
time, while I take a glance as to who our client is.” He picked a red-
covered volume from a line of books of reference beside the mantelpiece.
“Here he is,” said he, sitting down and flattening it out upon his knee.
“Lord Robert Walsingham de Vere St. Simon, second son of the Duke of
Balmoral. Hum! Arms: Azure, three caltrops in chief over a fess sable.
Born in 1846. He’s forty-one years of age, which is mature for marriage.
Was Under-Secretary for the colonies in a late administration. The Duke,
his father, was at one time Secretary for Foreign Affairs. They inherit
Plantagenet blood by direct descent, and Tudor on the distaff side. Ha!
Well, there is nothing very instructive in all this. I think that I must turn to
you, Watson, for something more solid.”
“I have very little difficulty in finding what I want,” said I, “for the
facts are quite recent, and the matter struck me as remarkable. I feared to
refer them to you, however, as I knew that you had an inquiry on hand
and that you disliked the intrusion of other matters.”
“Oh, you mean the little problem of the Grosvenor Square furniture
van. That is quite cleared up now–though, indeed, it was obvious from the
first. Pray give me the results of your newspaper selections.”
“Here is the first notice which I can find. It is in the personal column of
the Morning Post, and dates, as you see, some weeks back:
[289] “A marriage has been arranged [it says] and will, if rumour
is correct, very shortly take place, between Lord Robert St. Simon,
second son of the Duke of Balmoral, and Miss Hatty Doran, the
only daughter of Aloysius Doran, Esq., of San Francisco, Cal., U.
S. A.
That is all.”
“Terse and to the point,” remarked Holmes, stretching his long, thin
legs towards the fire.
“There was a paragraph amplifying this in one of the society papers of
the same week. Ah, here it is:
“The family of Lord Robert St. Simon has been thrown into the
greatest consternation by the strange and painful episodes which
have taken place in connection with his wedding. The ceremony,
as shortly announced in the papers of yesterday, occurred on the
previous morning; but it is only now that it has been possible to
confirm the strange rumours which have been so persistently
floating about. In spite of the attempts of the friends to hush the
matter up, so much public attention has now been drawn to it that
no good purpose can be served by affecting to disregard what is a
common subject for conversation.
“The ceremony, which was performed at St. George’s, Hanover
Square, was a very quiet one, no one being present save the father
of the bride, Mr. Aloysius Doran, the Duchess of Balmoral, Lord
Backwater, Lord Eustace, and Lady Clara St. Simon (the younger
brother and sister of the bridegroom), and Lady Alicia
Whittington. The whole party proceeded afterwards to the house of
Mr. Aloysius Doran, at Lancaster Gate, where breakfast had been
prepared. It appears that some little trouble was caused by a
woman, whose name has not been ascertained, who endeavoured
to force her way into the house after the bridal party, alleging that
she had some claim upon Lord St. Simon. It was only after a
painful and prolonged scene that she was ejected by the butler and
the footman. The bride, who had fortunately entered the house
before this unpleasant interruption, had sat down to breakfast with
the rest, when she complained of a sudden indisposition and
retired to her room. Her prolonged absence having caused some
comment, her father followed her, but learned from her maid that
she had only come up to her chamber for an instant, caught up an
ulster and bonnet, and hurried down to the passage. One of the
footmen declared that he had seen a lady leave the house thus
apparelled, but had refused to credit that it was his mistress,
believing her to be with the company. On ascertaining that his
daughter had disappeared, Mr. Aloysius Doran, in conjunction
with the bridegroom, instantly put themselves in communication
with the police, and very energetic inquiries are being made, which
will probably result in a speedy clearing up of this very singular
business. Up to a late hour last night, however, nothing had
transpired as to the whereabouts of the missing lady. There are
rumours of foul play in the matter, and it is said that the police
have caused the arrest of the woman who had caused the original
disturbance, in the belief that, from jealousy or some other motive,
she may have been concerned in the strange disappearance of the
bride.”
“Lord Robert St. Simon,” announced our page-boy, throwing open the
door. A gentleman entered, with a pleasant, cultured face, high-nosed and
pale, with something perhaps of petulance about the mouth, and with the
steady, well-opened eye of a man whose pleasant lot it had ever been to
command and to be obeyed. His manner was brisk, and yet his general
appearance gave an undue impression of age, for he had a slight forward
stoop and a little bend of the knees as he walked. His hair, too, as he
swept off his very curly-brimmed hat, was grizzled round the edges and
thin upon the top. As to his dress, it was careful to the verge of
foppishness, with high collar, black frock-coat, white waistcoat, yellow
gloves, patent-leather shoes, and light-coloured gaiters. He advanced
slowly into the room, turning his head from left to right, and swinging in
his right hand the cord which held his golden eyeglasses.
“Good-day, Lord St. Simon,” said Holmes, rising and bowing. “Pray
take the basket-chair. This is my friend and colleague, Dr. Watson. Draw
up a little to the fire, and we will talk this matter over.”
“A most painful matter to me, as you can most readily imagine, Mr.
Holmes. I have been cut to the quick. I understand that you have already
managed several delicate cases of this sort, sir, though I presume that they
were hardly from the same class of society.”
“No, I am descending.”
“I beg pardon.”
“My last client of the sort was a king.”
“Oh, really! I had no idea. And which king?”
“The King of Scandinavia.”
“What! Had he lost his wife?”
“You can understand,” said Holmes suavely, “that I extend to the
affairs of my other clients the same secrecy which I promise to you in
yours.”
“Of course! Very right! very right! I’m sure I beg pardon. As to my
own case, I am ready to give you any information which may assist you in
forming an opinion.”
“Thank you. I have already learned all that is in the public prints,
nothing more. I presume that I may take it as correct–this article, for
example, as to the disappearance of the bride.”
Lord St. Simon glanced over it. “Yes, it is correct, as far as it goes.”
“But it needs a great deal of supplementing before anyone could offer
an opinion. I think that I may arrive at my facts most directly by
questioning you.”
“Pray do so.”
“When did you first meet Miss Hatty Doran?”
“In San Francisco, a year ago.”
“You were travelling in the States?”
“Yes.”
“Did you become engaged then?”
[292] “No.”
“But you were on a friendly footing?”
“I was amused by her society, and she could see that I was amused.”
“Her father is very rich?”
“He is said to be the richest man on the Pacific slope.”
“And how did he make his money?”
“In mining. He had nothing a few years ago. Then he struck gold,
invested it, and came up by leaps and bounds.”
“Now, what is your own impression as to the young lady’s–your wife’s
character?”
The nobleman swung his glasses a little faster and stared down into the
fire. “You see, Mr. Holmes,” said he, “my wife was twenty before her
father became a rich man. During that time she ran free in a mining camp
and wandered through woods or mountains, so that her education has
come from Nature rather than from the schoolmaster. She is what we call
in England a tomboy, with a strong nature, wild and free, unfettered by
any sort of traditions. She is impetuous–volcanic, I was about to say. She
is swift in making up her mind and fearless in carrying out her
resolutions. On the other hand, I would not have given her the name
which I have the honour to bear”–he gave a little stately cough–“had not I
thought her to be at bottom a noble woman. I believe that she is capable
of heroic self-sacrifice and that anything dishonourable would be
repugnant to her.”
“Have you her photograph?”
“I brought this with me.” He opened a locket and showed us the full
face of a very lovely woman. It was not a photograph but an ivory
miniature, and the artist had brought out the full effect of the lustrous
black hair, the large dark eyes, and the exquisite mouth. Holmes gazed
long and earnestly at it. Then he closed the locket and handed it back to
Lord St. Simon.
“The young lady came to London, then, and you renewed your
acquaintance?”
“Yes, her father brought her over for this last London season. I met her
several times, became engaged to her, and have now married her.”
“She brought, I understand, a considerable dowry?”
“A fair dowry. Not more than is usual in my family.”
“And this, of course, remains to you, since the marriage is a fait
accompli?”
“I really have made no inquiries on the subject.”
“Very naturally not. Did you see Miss Doran on the day before the
wedding?”
“Yes.”
“Was she in good spirits?”
“Never better. She kept talking of what we should do in our future
lives.”
“Indeed! That is very interesting. And on the morning of the wedding?”
“She was as bright as possible–at least until after the ceremony.”
“And did you observe any change in her then?”
“Well, to tell the truth, I saw then the first signs that I had ever seen
that her temper was just a little sharp. The incident, however, was too
trivial to relate and can have no possible bearing upon the case.”
“Pray let us have it, for all that.”
“Oh, it is childish. She dropped her bouquet as we went towards the
vestry. She was passing the front pew at the time, and it fell over into the
pew. There was a moment’s delay, but the gentleman in the pew handed it
up to her again, and it did not appear to be the worse for the fall. Yet
when I spoke to her of the [293] matter, she answered me abruptly; and in
the carriage, on our way home, she seemed absurdly agitated over this
trifling cause.”
“Indeed! You say that there was a gentleman in the pew. Some of the
general public were present, then?”
“Oh, yes. It is impossible to exclude them when the church is open.”
“This gentleman was not one of your wife’s friends?”
“No, no; I call him a gentleman by courtesy, but he was quite a
common-looking person. I hardly noticed his appearance. But really I
think that we are wandering rather far from the point.”
“Lady St. Simon, then, returned from the wedding in a less cheerful
frame of mind than she had gone to it. What did she do on reentering her
father’s house?”
“I saw her in conversation with her maid.”
“And who is her maid?”
“Alice is her name. She is an American and came from California with
her.”
“A confidential servant?”
“A little too much so. It seemed to me that her mistress allowed her to
take great liberties. Still, of course, in America they look upon these
things in a different way.”
“How long did she speak to this Alice?”
“Oh, a few minutes. I had something else to think of.”
“You did not overhear what they said?”
“Lady St. Simon said something about ‘jumping a claim.’ She was
accustomed to use slang of the kind. I have no idea what she meant.”
“American slang is very expressive sometimes. And what did your wife
do when she finished speaking to her maid?”
“She walked into the breakfast-room.”
“On your arm?”
“No, alone. She was very independent in little matters like that. Then,
after we had sat down for ten minutes or so, she rose hurriedly, muttered
some words of apology, and left the room. She never came back.”
“But this maid, Alice, as I understand, deposes that she went to her
room, covered her bride’s dress with a long ulster, put on a bonnet, and
went out.”
“Quite so. And she was afterwards seen walking into Hyde Park in
company with Flora Millar, a woman who is now in custody, and who
had already made a disturbance at Mr. Doran’s house that morning.”
“Ah, yes. I should like a few particulars as to this young lady, and your
relations to her.”
Lord St. Simon shrugged his shoulders and raised his eyebrows. “We
have been on a friendly footing for some years–I may say on a very
friendly footing. She used to be at the Allegro. I have not treated her
ungenerously, and she had no just cause of complaint against me, but you
know what women are, Mr. Holmes. Flora was a dear little thing, but
exceedingly hot-headed and devotedly attached to me. She wrote me
dreadful letters when she heard that I was about to be married, and, to tell
the truth, the reason why I had the marriage celebrated so quietly was that
I feared lest there might be a scandal in the church. She came to Mr.
Doran’s door just after we returned, and she endeavoured to push her way
in, uttering very abusive expressions towards my wife, and even
threatening her, but I had foreseen the possibility of something of the sort,
and I had two police fellows [294] there in private clothes, who soon
pushed her out again. She was quiet when she saw that there was no good
in making a row.”
“Did your wife hear all this?”
“No, thank goodness, she did not.”
“And she was seen walking with this very woman afterwards?”
“Yes. That is what Mr. Lestrade, of Scotland Yard, looks upon as so
serious. It is thought that Flora decoyed my wife out and laid some
terrible trap for her.”
“Well, it is a possible supposition.”
“You think so, too?”
“I did not say a probable one. But you do not yourself look upon this as
likely?”
“I do not think Flora would hurt a fly.”
“Still, jealousy is a strange transformer of characters. Pray what is your
own theory as to what took place?”
“Well, really, I came to seek a theory, not to propound one. I have
given you all the facts. Since you ask me, however, I may say that it has
occurred to me as possible that the excitement of this affair, the
consciousness that she had made so immense a social stride, had the
effect of causing some little nervous disturbance in my wife.”
“In short, that she had become suddenly deranged?”
“Well, really, when I consider that she has turned her back–I will not
say upon me, but upon so much that many have aspired to without
success–I can hardly explain it in any other fashion.”
“Well, certainly that is also a conceivable hypothesis,” said Holmes,
smiling. “And now, Lord St. Simon, I think that I have nearly all my data.
May I ask whether you were seated at the breakfast-table so that you
could see out of the window?”
“We could see the other side of the road and the Park.”
“Quite so. Then I do not think that I need to detain you longer. I shall
communicate with you.”
“Should you be fortunate enough to solve this problem,” said our client,
rising.
“I have solved it.”
“Eh? What was that?”
“I say that I have solved it.”
“Where, then, is my wife?”
“That is a detail which I shall speedily supply.”
Lord St. Simon shook his head. “I am afraid that it will take wiser
heads than yours or mine,” he remarked, and bowing in a stately, old-
fashioned manner he departed.
“It is very good of Lord St. Simon to honour my head by putting it on a
level with his own,” said Sherlock Holmes, laughing. “I think that I shall
have a whisky and soda and a cigar after all this cross-questioning. I had
formed my conclusions as to the case before our client came into the
room.”
“My dear Holmes!”
“I have notes of several similar cases, though none, as I remarked
before, which were quite as prompt. My whole examination served to turn
my conjecture into a certainty. Circumstantial evidence is occasionally
very convincing, as when you find a trout in the milk, to quote Thoreau’s
example.”
“But I have heard all that you have heard.”
“Without, however, the knowledge of preexisting cases which serves
me so well. [295] There was a parallel instance in Aberdeen some years
back, and something on very much the same lines at Munich the year
after the Franco-Prussian War. It is one of these cases–but, hello, here is
Lestrade! Good-afternoon, Lestrade! You will find an extra tumbler upon
the sideboard, and there are cigars in the box.”
The official detective was attired in a pea-jacket and cravat, which gave
him a decidedly nautical appearance, and he carried a black canvas bag in
his hand. With a short greeting he seated himself and lit the cigar which
had been offered to him.
“What’s up, then?” asked Holmes with a twinkle in his eye. “You look
dissatisfied.”
“And I feel dissatisfied. It is this infernal St. Simon marriage case. I can
make neither head nor tail of the business.”
“Really! You surprise me.”
“Who ever heard of such a mixed affair? Every clue seems to slip
through my fingers. I have been at work upon it all day.”
“And very wet it seems to have made you,” said Holmes, laying his
hand upon the arm of the pea-jacket.
“Yes, I have been dragging the Serpentine.”
“In heaven’s name, what for?”
“In search of the body of Lady St. Simon.”
Sherlock Holmes leaned back in his chair and laughed heartily.
“Have you dragged the basin of Trafalgar Square fountain?” he asked.
“Why? What do you mean?”
“Because you have just as good a chance of finding this lady in the one
as in the other.”
Lestrade shot an angry glance at my companion. “I suppose you know
all about it,” he snarled.
“Well, I have only just heard the facts, but my mind is made up.”
“Oh, indeed! Then you think that the Serpentine plays no part in the
matter?”
“I think it very unlikely.”
“Then perhaps you will kindly explain how it is that we found this in
it?” He opened his bag as he spoke, and tumbled onto the floor a wedding-
dress of watered silk, a pair of white satin shoes, and a bride’s wreath and
veil, all discoloured and soaked in water. “There,” said he, putting a new
wedding-ring upon the top of the pile. “There is a little nut for you to
crack, Master Holmes.”
“Oh, indeed!” said my friend, blowing blue rings into the air. “You
dragged them from the Serpentine?”
“No. They were found floating near the margin by a park-keeper. They
have been identified as her clothes, and it seemed to me that if the clothes
were there the body would not be far off.”
“By the same brilliant reasoning, every man’s body is to be found in
the neighbourhood of his wardrobe. And pray what did you hope to arrive
at through this?”
“At some evidence implicating Flora Millar in the disappearance.”
“I am afraid that you will find it difficult.”
“Are you, indeed, now?” cried Lestrade with some bitterness. “I am
afraid, Holmes, that you are not very practical with your deductions and
your inferences. You have made two blunders in as many minutes. This
dress does implicate Miss Flora Millar.”
“And how?”
“In the dress is a pocket. In the pocket is a card-case. In the card-case is
a note. [296] And here is the very note.” He slapped it down upon the table
in front of him. “Listen to this:
Now my theory all along has been that Lady St. Simon was decoyed away
by Flora Millar, and that she, with confederates, no doubt, was
responsible for her disappearance. Here, signed with her initials, is the
very note which was no doubt quietly slipped into her hand at the door
and which lured her within their reach.”
“Very good, Lestrade,” said Holmes, laughing. “You really are very
fine indeed. Let me see it.” He took up the paper in a listless way, but his
attention instantly became riveted, and he gave a little cry of satisfaction.
“This is indeed important,” said he.
“Ha! you find it so?”
“Extremely so. I congratulate you warmly.”
Lestrade rose in his triumph and bent his head to look. “Why,” he
shrieked, “you’re looking at the wrong side!”
“On the contrary, this is the right side.”
“The right side? You’re mad! Here is the note written in pencil over
here.”
“And over here is what appears to be the fragment of a hotel bill, which
interests me deeply.”
“There’s nothing in it. I looked at it before,” said Lestrade.
“Oct. 4th, rooms 8s., breakfast 2s. 6d., cocktail 1s., lunch 2s.
6d., glass sherry, 8d.
“The case has been an interesting one,” remarked Holmes when our
visitors had left us, “because it serves to show very clearly how simple
the explanation may be of an affair which at first sight seems to be almost
inexplicable. Nothing could be more natural than the sequence of events
as narrated by this lady, and nothing stranger than the result when viewed,
for instance, by Mr. Lestrade, of Scotland Yard.”
“You were not yourself at fault at all, then?”
“From the first, two facts were very obvious to me, the one that the
lady had been quite willing to undergo the wedding ceremony, the other
that she had repented of it within a few minutes of returning home.
Obviously something had occurred during the morning, then, to cause her
to change her mind. What could that something be? She could not have
spoken to anyone when she was out, for she had been in the company of
the bridegroom. Had she seen someone, then? If she had, it must be
someone from America because she had spent so short a time in this
country that she could hardly have allowed anyone to acquire so deep an
influence over her that the mere sight of him would induce her to change
her plans so completely. You see we have already arrived, by a process of
exclusion, at the idea that she might have seen an American. Then who
could this American be, and why should he possess so much influence
over her? It might be a lover; it might be a husband. Her young
womanhood had, I knew, been spent in rough scenes and under strange
conditions. So far I had got before I ever heard Lord St. Simon’s
narrative. When he told us of a man in a pew, of the change in the bride’s
manner, of so transparent a device for obtaining a note as the dropping of
a bouquet, of her resort to her confidential maid, and of her very
significant allusion to claim-jumping–which in miners’ parlance means
taking possession of that which another person has a prior claim to–the
whole situation became absolutely clear. She had gone off with a man,
and the man was either a lover or was a previous husband–the chances
being in favour of the latter.”
“And how in the world did you find them?”
“It might have been difficult, but friend Lestrade held information in
his hands the value of which he did not himself know. The initials were,
of course, of the highest importance, but more valuable still was it to
know that within a week he had settled his bill at one of the most select
London hotels.”
“How did you deduce the select?”
“By the select prices. Eight shillings for a bed and eightpence for a
glass of sherry pointed to one of the most expensive hotels. There are not
many in London which charge at that rate. In the second one which I
visited in Northumberland Avenue, I learned by an inspection of the book
that Francis H. Moulton, an American gentleman, had left only the day
before, and on looking over the entries against him, I came upon the very
items which I had seen in the duplicate bill. His letters were to be
forwarded to 226 Gordon Square; so thither I travelled, and being
fortunate enough to find the loving couple at home, I ventured to give
them some paternal advice and to point out to them that it would be better
in every way that they should make their position a little clearer both to
the general public and to Lord St. Simon in particular. I invited them to
meet him here, and, as you see, I made him keep the appointment.”
[301] “But with no very good result,” I remarked. “His conduct was
certainly not very gracious.”
“Ah, Watson,” said Holmes, smiling, “perhaps you would not be very
gracious either, if, after all the trouble of wooing and wedding, you found
yourself deprived in an instant of wife and of fortune. I think that we may
judge Lord St. Simon very mercifully and thank our stars that we are
never likely to find ourselves in the same position. Draw your chair up
and hand me my violin, for the only problem we have still to solve is how
to while away these bleak autumnal evenings.”